Heiko van Brizen | In The Godless, Dying World

This medieval fantasy story takes place in the land of Mimaväli. Old legends state that the world was created when Mima the Farmer plowed voidspace until, from the primordial nothingness, soil arose and Mimaväli (literally meaning "Mima's Field" in Mimakiil) was made. With his last act, he placed the seeds of life onto Mimaväli and wept upon them, creating the rivers and lakes so that life could thrive. He cried for he knew he would not stay to see the life he created flourish, as the great work of creating the world forced him into an eternal slumber, his mighty powers sapped and stretched to their limits. This is when mortal life is believed to have come to exist, knowing no gods but the world itself, living in simple communities in the cold darkness. The greatest of the beings that grew on Mimaväli, the dragons, discovered what happened to their world's creator and saw themselves as Mima's rightful heirs as rulers of the world. In the beginning, they sought to gently shepherd the other races and used their powers and magics to create wondrous gifts, such as when the greatest of them—the archdragon Tulisvala—poured his fire into the great lamp that would become the Sun, while his siblings would create the stars, thus diving time into night and day.

Over time, however, they would grow despotic. Their authority corrupted them and they would become known as the Dragon Tyrants. They ruled with an iron grip for a thousand years, forcing all to worship them and offer sacrifices in their names. This would all come to an end when an event known as the "Great Rebellion Against Dragonkind" began, led by a young man destined for sacrifice but had been freed by a warrior who had betrayed the dragons she served, who then supposedly travelled to the Worldfog at the edge of the world and glimpsed at the sleeping Mima, learning his secrets and his magics which had long been privy to only the dragons themselves. This young man would become known as the Virgin Saint, a symbol of hope for a people who had long suffered great indignities under the dragons. Right by his side was his fiercest companion, the red-haired warrior who had freed him. She would lead the armies that would strike down the dragons, while he would guide the people in this time of turmoil and teach them the glory of the god Mima, who was indeed the only being truly worthy of worship.

In the years after, mankind became united under what would be known as the Saintschurch. The Virgin Saint would outlive his beloved companion, who would posthumously be honoured with the title of Warring Saint, becoming the second to achieve the title of Saint. The dragons came to be believed to have been sent to the underworld of Manala, trapped there alongside the souls of mortal evildoers, who suffer an eternal frost. The souls of righteous individuals are instead said to go to Mima's celestial resting place, to slumber alongside him.

When the Virgin Saint too would pass, the Saintschurch came to be in turmoil. Eventually, it was decided that a Council of Regents made up of the highest church fathers would succeed him, to rule until a valid successor is named—one worthy to be named Saint. It was during this time that the modern dogma known as the 'Saintwalk' would develop, requiring all to follow the examples laid forth by the two Saints and emulate them in life. Men came to be seen as both the spiritual and temporal leaders of humanity, who must serve as wise, chaste, and gentle arbitrators, while women came to be seen as warriors—protectors and keepers of the home who, must be brave and impulsive on the battlefields of both war and birth. The land would be divided into three sees (each headed by a Patriarch) and one territory. Relationships were to be forged between men and women, as such is tradition. Any who deviated from these norms (like homosexuals, fetishists, fornicators, and so on) came to be seen as infidels, as fake believers who would be rightly shunned from society.

To guard the people from any dissidents, each see would also come to be defended by a Warring Chapter, modelled after the old army of the Red-Haired Warrior and comprising entirely of the greatest fighting women of the realms. These would become the standing army of the Saintschurch, each chapter serving one of the Five Patriarchs. Magic would become restricted to only the Church itself, to prevent its practice by unruly elements. Though humans cannot access magic as the dragons did, they are able to bring it forth through the use of runes, said to be able to somehow commune with the sleeping Mima and bring forth his power. Runes can be carved or written onto surfaces, with different combinations having varying effects. An example would be that a statue could be carved with a verse of animation (a verse being a recognised combination of runes to cause a specific affect) to be made into a servile golem, such as the kinds often seen on church grounds, or walls may be fortified with verses of strength to keep them standing no matter what they bear, or even more drastic cases such as having ones own body carved with a verse of life to temporarily regain ones lost youth. Verses carved onto bodies are typically far stronger than those onto soulless objects, but doing so saps the very spirit, with those repeatedly abusing and scarring their body eventually withering away into nothing but husks.

To prevent people from attempting to learn all this on their own, literacy was also forbidden outright for those not part of the male priestly caste. Instead, priests were to teach their communities what is right and what is wrong, and guide them on the Saintwalk so that they may not stray, lest they be culled by the righteous hand of the Warring Chapters.

Four hundred years after the passing of the Virgin Saint, the world would enter into another crisis, this time in what would later become known as the Creeping Nothing. Though the dragons had been cruel, they had successfully kept the land of Mimaväli safe, true to their roles as shepherds. With no one left to continue breathing fire into the sky, astronomer-monks noticed that the sun and the stars were dimming with each year, as the world become colder and darker over time (a most unusual thing as seasons are completely nonexistent in this world). Most terrifyingly, it became noted that the Worldfog appeared to be creeping closer and closer as time went on, a slow unravelling threatening to undo the work of Mima, from which strange and unnatural entities seem to spew forth unlike any proper Mima-made life, beasts of wrong-nothing that bring misery and death in their appearance. The Five Patriarchs of the Council of Regents decided to bury this information from both the commonfolk and the Church so as to not cause fear, while secretly searching for methods to spare humanity of another dark age akin to the earliest days after the slumbering of Mima. Solutions have ranged from moving south to the cursed land of Nurme, or warding off the fog with cleverly-designed versegates, to even having each person ritually carved with verses of warmth and protection to hopefully guard them from frost and fog, but none of these are foolproof. The only thing they were too wary to attempt was a pilgrimage to the Worldfog, for the consequences of feeding the fog are entirely unknown. If this could advance the rate at which it grows, if it could attract more things from beyond reality towards our world, or something worse—the Patriarchs would not dare risk it, even for the chance to meet with slumbering Mima. For what it's worth, people have noticed the changes, though the priests—who are as much in the dark as they are—have urged calm and promised all would be well. In the furthest corners of the world, the ground freezes and crops fail as snow has begun falling from the sky, previously only seen upon the highest mountain peaks, while inner regions have noted unusually cold winds and harsh nights. People have been going missing all over, clearly not the work of mere bandits or heretics, and this shall only grow worse as our story goes along unless something is done to combat it.

The Worldfog is actually how mortals perceive voidspace that exists beyond their realm. It is quintessential nothing, and the further within it one goes, the more likely they are to both figuratively and literally lose themselves. Whatever the fog is, mortals cannot truly conceive it.

At the beginning of our story, the regions are as follows:

The See of Vaulķaz, located in the north—mainly home to lowland swamps, marshes, and wetlands. The regions main extract is amber, notable for its high capacity to handle verses. Its people have always been firm believers in Mima and the Saints, with a reputation as being highly religious and conservative. Its capital is the city of Liegava, smallest of the three patriarchal seats (with a population of around forty thousand), sitting on the southern edge of the Great Čepgrindos Marsh and known for its rather beautiful vibrantly painted wooden architecture and city walls, the symbol of which is a triskelion (shown on maps and signs, as nearly every town in the Mimaväli has its own symbol to be used in place of lettering, which is forbidden in public spaces). Vaulķaz is defended by the Daughters of Mima, headquartered within the Abbey of Life within Liegava, led by one Grandmistress Daiga. The Patriarch of Vaulķaz, who rules from the Painted Palace of the North, is currently Patriach Galindas, an elderly and arrogant man who has managed to make even the typically zealous Vaulķazi think he is too fanatical, despite their lingering trust in his admittedly high capabilities, with him having well kept his mind even into his late years.

The See of Dorchlund, located in the west—comprising rugged hills, windswept moors, jagged crags, and ancient woodlands. The Dorchlunders which inhabit it are considered a cold and unhumorous people, who mainly focus on the mining of Dorchlund's vast quantities of stone, copper and iron—the lifeblood of the region, seen in the grand stone architecture of Dorchlund's larger towns. The capital of Dorchlund is the three-walled city of Wollenheim, the second largest city in Mimaväli with a population of around a hundred thousand, the symbol of which is a saltire cross. Its Patriarch, who rules from the Stone Palace of the West. The current Patriarch is Olrik van Volksborg, an astute and practical man born in the countryside, who seeks to ensure the authority of Saintschurch is not undermined even in this time of crisis. Dorchlund is protected by the Ordnung, seen as the strictest and cruellest of all the Warring Chapters, having well kept the order in their lands thus far. They are headquartered in the Abbey of Peace within the town of Noningen a quarter day west of Wollenheim, and are led by Grandmistress Adelheid.

The See of Epirene, located in the east—the most fertile part of Mimaväli, with numerous well-populated villages and towns built along the countless rivers of the region which connect the region, while the generally warm rolling plains of the inland make for excellent farmland—for which Epirene has oft served as a breadbasket for the other two regions. The Epirenes have a reputation as being querulous and needlessly sentimental by some, with a strong tradition of poetry and song. Its capital, with a population of nearly three hundred thousand, is the great city of Anatopol, the symbol of which is a splayed hand. The Patriarch of Epirene, living in the Marble Palace of the East where the Council of Regents meets, has long enjoyed primacy over the other two Patriarchs as first among equals, due to Epirene having been where the Virgin Saint once held court. The current Patriarch is Anastasios Kostopoulos—a once-respected man who has begun to wither away in his abuse of bodily verses to preserve his life, now struggling to keep order among his agitated populace, particularly after the passing of the old Grandmistress of the Skoutatoi which protect Epirene from the Abbey of Love along the southern mountains, with the naming of a valid successor having been troublesome to say the least.

The Territory of Nurme, lying in the south and feared as a cursed land where the majority of the fighting during the Great Rebellion occurred, filled with gloomy badlands and ashen wastes. It is where Lendva, the old capital of the dragons is located. It is separated from Dorchlund and Epirene by a series of mountains, largely isolated from the sees and abandoned entirely by the Saintschurch, which has historically never maintained a presence in it. Its inhabitants are an odd folk who inhabit the ruins of the dragons, maintaining the cities as best they can. They spurn outsiders, and so any who enter into the draconic ruins of Nurme often meet their deaths at the hands of traps which have been continually rearmed by the Nurmerahvas. Even the ancient golems and wrathful undead which fill these ruins and attack outsiders on sight have accepted the Nurmerahvas as their own, seeing them as fellow servants of the dead dragons, which is not wrong, as without the influence of the Church they have come to worship the figures they see in the reliefs and statues covering their cities. The Nurmerahvas, due to the strong magic present in their ruins, often also carry mutations: odd horns, glowing eyes, dark scaly skin, extra limbs, sometimes wing-like growths, and rarely even tiny flame-sacs within their throats that allow them to spit out cinder. They speak a dialect of Mimakiil that's largely similar to the one spoken in the days of dragon rule, unlike the Puhas Mimakiil (or Pure Mimakiil) used up north, the language of which was modified to remove supposed draconic influence and be more like the "original" tongue spoken by the first humans. Puhas Mimakiil is the closest to a common tongue that exists, although it's mainly used as an administrative language by the Saintschurch, with local languages such as Epirenika, Dorchlundisch, and Vaulķazic prevailing among the general populace.

Despite its cursed nature, Nurme has been the least affected by the Creeping Nothing. No cold has reached this land, and the fog dares not tread upon it any further, as noted by scouts sent by the Patriarchs to estimate the viability of colonising the south.